Wednesday, August 15, 2012

Joe the Plumber Would Build a Fence, Send Military to Border

2008 political prop and current candidate for U.S. Congress (no, really) Joe the Plumber has lived up to snowbird stereotypes by coming in from the Midwest and yelling about things.

Mr. Plumber (real name: Sam Wurzelbacher) gained notoriety in 2008 for challenging then-candidate Barack Obama's views, and subsequently flipped that fame into a primary victory in the race for Ohio's 9th district Congressional seat. He was in Prescott over the weekend to bring a bit of star (?) power to state Sen. Lori Klein's campaign to move to District 1's state house seat, where he spoke his mind about immigration and border security policies:

For those not watching the video, Joe said: "For years I've said, 'Put a damn fence on that border going to Mexico and start shooting ...' that's how I feel. I'm not going to hide it just because I'm running for office. I want the borders protected, and I'm very adamant about that."

But he didn't stop there, reiterating his message at a rally the following day:

Of course, he took care to follow that up "It's not because I'm bloodthirsty. It's not because I want to kill illegal immigrants, it's because I want my border secure. It's all it comes down to."

I get it — make an extreme statement about border security and guns, get popular with the right crowd, get elected. Makes sense.

But considering what happened at a Safeway last January, a theater in Aurora last month, a Sikh temple in Wisconsin just over a week ago, and in College Station, Texas, just two days ago, it might be time to cool it on the gun rhetoric for a while, right?

For more, check out the stories at Prescott eNews here and here, where you can read a bit more about Lori Klein's disgust with her local "Chamber of Communists."